After the torrential success over the past years, with hundred thousands of people on the road side, and millions of spectators on television all over the world, the Tour of Almaty has finally gone the first big step to becoming a Grand Tour, and was expanded from one fantastic day of racing to two. "The Tour of Almaty will be as spectacular as the Tour de France is", three-time winner Alexey Lutsenko said in a big interview today.

There are no profiles available yet, but the first day is a surely spectacular urban city circuit and stage 2 follows the same route as the usual Tour of Almaty one day race, but with a finish on the Medea mountain instead

For whatever reason, some other teams but Astana are participating again

Astana Pro Team

Vino - Astana Motors

Kazakhstan National Team

Delko Marseille Provence KTM

Synergy Baku Cycle Project

Tabriz Shahrdary Team

Terengganu Cycle Team

Uzbekistan National Team

Ningxia Sports Lottery - Lyvall Cycle Team

Rietumu Banka - Riga

Kolss Cycle Team

Pishgaman Cycling Team

Bridgestone Anchor Cycle Team

Wilier Triestina–Selle Italia

Team Illuminate

Roth–Akros

Minsk Cycling Club

0711 / Cycling

Bike Channel Canyon

Slovakia National Team

Lutsenko recently won a stage in a smaller Spanish race called Vuelta a España and in the relatively important World Championships last week he was in the attack with 3k to go, so he seems to have peaked perfectly to defend his title and win the Tour of Almaty for the 4th time in a row. On his side he will have Jakob Fuglsang to cover the attacks from the strong competition of Iranians and Remy de Gregorio

"Alexey is in a good condition now. I think it might be a bit difficult for Fuglsang to keep up with him. In any case, they will ride as two captains. I tend to think that Alexey has better chances. He knows Medeo and every turn there. It will be easier for him to contest for a win there. But it is possible that somebody from another team might happen to be stronger. We shall see what we shall see. But there is a bonus of knowledge of this mountain for Alexey – he knows where to rest and where to accelerate", - Alexander Vinokurov told about his team's tactics at the fifth jubilee Tour of Almaty-2017.

there's still no start list of whatever kind in sight, as far as I can see...

Pellaud's room mate in Almaty is Edwin Avila though, so I guess he is racing

I watched a very blurry livestream of the team presentation. Def teams there, no idea who most of the riders were. Very fancy pieces of equipment tech wise - drones and the like , and reading the FB page it seems no expense is spared. Perhaps it'll be like some Coupe de France races with SL confirmed on the morning. Odd given all the teams are there.

the highlights are sh*t though... basically just some nice images in random order

Oh my.

I have rarely seen race 'highlights' that told so little of what happened in the race (at least we had a quick shot of the break on stage 2) and were so filled with self-promotion of TengrinewsTV, the Astana Pro Team & their sponsor Astana Group, the Kazakh cycling federation, and in general.

This weekend, the sport of cycling certainly made benefit glorious nation of ... say it together as one ... KAZAKHSTAN!!